The Year's Best Dark Fantasy and Horror (24 page)

At first, when he’d seen such things, Rodric had felt—maybe not pity, but sympathy. It must have come as a terrible shock to these wealthy, commanding folk—the men often cold and ruthless, the women haughty, disdainful—that they could despair and die like the most downtrodden villeins. Little wonder, in the light of such revelation, they had shown a last a flicker of humanity, had made a final desperate gesture to win favor for their wretched souls. That was how Rodric
had
felt. Now, of course, he scoffed. He’d seen too much pain and sorrow. Why single the nobility out for sentiment? This callous, authoritarian breed; these overbearing braggarts; these cruel and arrogant sots who felt the world owed them position, who felt they were born to wealth and privilege while others must swim and wallow in cesspits of degradation.

“I don’t care about you,” he said, as he stared up at the house. Even louder, he added: “Do you understand . . . I don’t care about any of you!”

“I know that, my lord,” the boy said from the direction of the stables.

Rodric turned and saw that he had opened the two doors, revealing a dark and dusty interior, but also a hefty contraption of some sort, a great mechanism draped with a canvas awning.

“What’s this?” Rodric asked impatiently. “Is the key under there? I need the key, damn you!”

The boy answered by tearing away the awning, sending plumes of dust into the air. Beneath it there was an infamous piece of battlefield ballistae: the dread
scorpion,
or archery-machine. In essence, it was an immense crossbow mounted on a wheeled base, but fitted with many springs and levers and two outspread arms of hugely-tensioned wood, so that it might hurl twenty cloth-yard bolts in a single volley.

Rodric’s jaw dropped.

He’d seen these devilish devices cut swathes through lines of infantry, bring down entire companies of galloping knights. Even now, this one appeared to be fully primed. Maybe a dozen missiles were loaded into its central grooves, their needle-sharp bodkin tips glinting in the sunset.

By accident or design, he was standing directly in their line of flight.

“I know that,” the boy said again. “It’s why I must do this.” Once again his eyes were sodden with tears, but his diminutive fist was clenched determinedly around the handle that served as the
scorpion
’s trigger.

“What do you mean?” Rodric tried not to show the dull fear creeping through him.

“I put my family here, in this stable . . . because this machine was here. I thought I could use it to protect them, should the wolves come. But now I have a better use for it.” Then the boy bellowed—in a raw, hoarse voice:
“I will save my people!”

Rodric hardly dared move. “Don’t be foolish. You can’t save them, you know that.”

Tears streamed down the boy’s hollow cheeks, cutting tracks through the encrusted dirt. “
You
took them away.
You
can give them back.”

Rodric shook his head. “Who do you think I am, God?”

“I know who you are. You are . . . ”

“Don’t be a dolt! Whatever I told you is nonsense! You surely realize that?”

He slammed open his visor, to show that the lean bearded features beneath: pock-marked, criss-crossed with old scars—very human, very mortal. It was never pleasant to reveal that you were a fraud, but on this occasion he felt he could live with the shame.

The boy remained solemn; his grip tightened on the archery-machine’s trigger. Many times in this blighted land, Rodric had encountered folk so deranged that they’d believe almost anything. Apparently, here was one more deranged than most.

“You cannot lie to me,” the boy stated. “I remained here for days after everyone else died. But it was hopeless. You didn’t come for me, so I went looking for you. I prayed that I might find you. And I did! At first I was going to plead, to beg for you to show pity . . . just a little pity. But I see now that begging and pleading falls silent on ears such as yours
.
So, instead . . .
 I demand!
”

Rodric was now calculating the distance he’d have to run to put himself out of range. He was about twelve feet from the row of arrow-heads, which meant that scrambling backwards was out of the question. A quick dash sideways might suffice. Most of these heavy war-machines were mounted on a pivot so they could be swiveled, though he doubted this emaciated stripling would have the strength to do that. Even so, it would be a risk. Just for the moment, he opted to keep talking.

“Listen to me, boy . . . what I did to you was cruel, despicable. But it’s . . . ”

“You’ve got to give them back!”
the boy shouted.
“All of them!”

Rodric was stunned to silence. Frantic thoughts raced through his head. The
scorpion
looked old; almost certainly it was ill-maintained. Maybe it wouldn’t work? But could he take that risk—wouldn’t it be better to pre-empt the situation and try to hit the boy with his throwing-dagger? But no—these were gambles; wild, desperate gambles.

“You must know that I can’t give them back,” he said, in a firm but fatherly tone. “In your heart of hearts, you must know. No one can do that but Our Lord.”

The boy chewed his pale lip. “If you can’t return those you have already claimed . . . you must at least spare the rest.”

“I cannot spare them.”

“Cannot or
will
not?”

“I cannot.” Rodric made a friendly gesture. “
We
cannot. Understand me when I say that . . . 
we.
It’s you and me now. We’re practically all that’s left. But at least we’re together, and we should stay that way . . . ”

The lad’s youthful brow darkened; his tear-bright eyes narrowed to slivers. “It isn’t
we!
It isn’t we at all! You’re not my friend, you’re my enemy! And If I can’t save or spare my people, I’ll do the next best thing, and avenge them . . . ”

“No!” Rodric shouted, seeing the muscles bunch in the small shoulder. He grabbed for the dagger at his belt. “You damned village-idiot, what good will it do you . . . ?”

The lever
clacked
backwards. There was
twang,
a violent recoil and a tumult of hissing air. Rodric was struck several times with battering-ram force.

He tottered where he stood, but managed to remain upright—just.

Seconds of dizziness passed. The air cooled as the sun slipped down over the top of the palisade. Through it all, the boy stayed in the doorway to the stable, the eyes wide in his white, ghost-like face. Rodric wanted to laugh at him, to nod and wink, to say: “You see . . . I told you this was pointless. That you and I should be companions . . . ”

But it was difficult to concentrate on words when so many parts of his body felt as if they had all been caught between hammers and anvils. It was difficult even to hold the dagger, let alone throw it—not that throwing it would serve any purpose now. The weapon slid through his fingers and dropped to the floor. Rodric wanted to drop after it, but an inner voice told him not to, told him to stay on his feet and go and seek for help.

He nodded, as though receiving useful advice.

Help would be a good idea.

His armor was robust; it would have protected him to some extent, but several of the arrows had penetrated. He understood that without needing to glance down.

He stumbled back to the gate, and out through it. Beyond the palisade, Harefoot was grazing by the roadside. Far beyond the faithful brute, the last rays of blood-red sunlight were flooding across the land, the last spark of daytime about to wink out—and with it what remained of the late summer warmth, for a bone-numbing chill had come rushing in and wrapped itself around Rodric. He tried to ignore it, but it was a difficult task. Suddenly he was shivering. Even the hot fluid gurgling inside his armor failed to warm him.

He strode towards his horse, but when he got there found that his strength had drained to such an extent that he couldn’t even mount up. His mailed foot was too heavy to lift to the stirrup. Then there were the feathered shafts; they got in the way, kept pushing him backwards from Harefoot’s flank.

Rodric leaned sideways against the horse, exhausted. At first, he didn’t notice the figure step up behind him. He only realized there was anyone there at all when a hand came to rest on his shoulder. He turned to look—and saw eyes that were rotted holes in green parchment, a curved mouth full of peg-teeth, and over the top of it all, a head-dress made from twisted iron barbs.

A crown, no less.

Rodric chuckled hoarsely.

King Death.

What it’s like to long for daylight, to be—in
love
with daylight—and you can never see it for real, never feel the warmth, smell the scents of it or properly hear the sounds—
never
?

Why Light?
Tanith Lee

Part One

My first memory is the fear of light.

The passage was dank and dark and water dripped, and my mother carried me, although by then I could walk. I was three, or a little younger. My mother was terrified. She was consumed by terror, and she shook, and her skin gave off a faint metallic smell I had never caught from her before. Her hands were cold as ice. I could feel that, even through the thick shawl in which she’d wrapped me. She said, over and over, “It’s all right, baby. It’s all right. It will be okay. You’ll see. Just a minute, only one. It’ll be all right.”

By then of course I too was frightened. I was crying, and I think I wet myself, though I hadn’t done anything like that since babyhood.

Then the passage turned, and there was a tall iron gate—I know it’s iron, now. At the time it only looked like a burnt-out coal.

“Oh God,” said my mother.

But she thrust out one hand and pushed at the gate and it grudged open with a rusty scraping, just wide enough to let us through.

I would have seen the vast garden outside the house, played there. But this wasn’t the garden. It was a high place, held in only by a low stone wall and a curving break of poplar trees. They looked very black, not green the way the house lamps made trees in the garden. Something was happening to the sky; that was what made the poplars so black. I thought it was moonrise, but I knew the moon was quite new, and only a full moon could dilute the darkness so much. The stars were watery and blue, weak, like dying gas flames.

My mother stood there, just outside the iron gate, holding me, shaking. “It’s all right . . . just a minute . . . only one . . . ”

Suddenly something happened.

It was like a storm—a lightning flash maybe, but in slow-motion, that swelled up out of the dark. It was pale, then silver, and then like gold. It was like a high trumpet note, or the opening chords of some great concerto.

I sat bolt upright in my mother’s arms, even as she shook ever more violently. I think her teeth were chattering.

But I could only open my eyes wide. Even my mouth opened, as if to drink the sudden light.

It was the color of a golden flower and it seemed to boil, and enormous clouds poured slowly upward out of it, brass and wine and rose. And a huge noise came from everywhere, rustling and rushing—and weird flutings and squeakings and trills—birdsong—only I didn’t recognize it.

My mother now hoarsely wept. I don’t know how she never dropped me.

Next they came out and drew us in again, and Tyfa scooped me quickly away as my mother collapsed on the ground. So I was frightened again, and screamed.

They closed the gate and shut us back in darkness. The one minute was over. But I had seen a dawn.

Part Two

Fourteen and a half years later, and I stood on the drive, looking at the big black limousine. Marten was loading my bags into the boot. Musette and Kousu were crying quietly. One or two others lingered about; nobody seemed to grasp what exactly was the correct way to behave. My mother hadn’t yet come out of the house.

By that evening my father was dead over a decade—he had died when I was six, my mother a hundred and seventy. They had lived together a century anyway, were already tired of each other and had taken other lovers from our community. But that made his death worse, apparently. Ever since, every seventh evening, she would go into the little shrine she had made to him, cut one of her fingers and let go a drop of blood in the vase below his photograph. Her name is Juno, my mother, after a Roman goddess, and I’d called her by her name since I was an adult.

“She should be here,” snapped Tyfa, irritated. He too was Juno’s occasional lover, but generally he seemed exasperated by her. “Locked in that damn room,” he added sourly. He meant the shrine.

I said nothing, and Tyfa stalked off along the terrace, and started pacing about, a tall strong man of around two hundred or so, no one was sure—dark-haired as most of us were at Severin. His skin had a light brownness from a long summer of sun-exposure. He had always been able to take the sun, often for several hours in one day. I too have black hair, and my skin, even in winter, is pale brown. I can endure daylight all day long, day after day. I can
live
by day.

Marten had closed the boot. Casperon had got into the driver’s seat, leaving the car door open, and was trying the engine. Its loud purring would no doubt penetrate the house’s upper storey, and the end rooms which comprised Juno’s apartment.

Abruptly she came sweeping out from the house.

June has dark red hair. Her skin is white. Her slanting eyes are the dark bleak blue of a northern sea, seen in a foreign movie with subtitles. When I was a child I adored her. She
was
my goddess. I’d have died for her, but that stopped. It stopped forever.

She walked straight past the others, as if no one else were there. She stood in front of me. She was still an inch or so taller than I, though I’m tall.

“Well,” she said. She stared into my face, hers cold as marble, and all of her stone-still—this, the woman who trembled and clutched me to her, whispering that all would be well, when I was three years old.